NATURAL RESOURCE
ECONOMICS
NATURAL RESOURCE ECONOMICS
Sponsored by a Grant TÁMOP-4.1.2-08/2/A/KMR-2009-0041 Course Material Developed by Department of Economics,
Faculty of Social Sciences, Eötvös Loránd University Budapest (ELTE) Department of Economics, Eötvös Loránd University Budapest
Institute of Economics, Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Balassi Kiadó, Budapest
NATURAL RESOURCE ECONOMICS
Author: Gábor Ungvári
Supervised by Gábor Ungvári January 2011
ELTE Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Economics
NATURAL RESOURCE ECONOMICS
Week 4
The system of water circulation and the impact of its change
on well-being
Gábor Ungvári
Draft
• Nature is an independent system – view as a capital, its basic supporting services are the water, carbon, nutrient circulation and soil formation.
• The size and diversity of this capital define the
benefits of the ecosystem services for well-being.
• The importance of water generates from the fact that it is the fuel and the carrying medium of these
circulations at the same time.
• The connection of land use and the natural capital
match the question of water management and well-
being.
Exploring the relationship between well-being and ecological performance
Costanza’s hypothesis
Summarising the economic examinations relevant to natural resources, ordered by types of ecological systems (biomes) and services.
The specific values relating to the given area change in conjunction with the ecological system’s level of water-usage.
Costanza et al: The Value of ecosystem services: putting the issues in perspective. In Ecological Economics 25(1998) 67–2.
Grass / rangelands
Temperate / boreal forest Tropical forest
Tidal marsh / mangroves
Swamps / floodplains
• The ability of transpiration drives the temperature of the plants, that influences the pace of warming above the surface
• The bottleneck condition of delaying warming up of the air is the quantity of available humidity in the soil.
Water intolerancy Kravchik, Varga – People and Water www.peopleandwater.sk
• Temperature differences between the sealed and non-sealed surfaces, but:
• There are differences of non-sealed
surfaces by the plant / habitat type –
forest, plow-land
Connection among the 3 basic supporting ecosystem services, the climate and the water circulation
C.W. Thornthwaite, F.K Hare: Unasylva, 1955, 9. Évf./ 2
Integrated watershed management – Manual UNEP 2004 www.unep.or.jp
The driving forces of climate processes:
sunshine – precipitation – transpiration, means ecosystem
functioning – seasonal water surplus – water retention – water scarcity
Y axis: cm precipitation, or the amount of energy that needs to transpirate it
X axis: months from january – to january
Thornthwaite, Hare (Unasylva, 1955, 9. Évf./ 2)
• The vapour intake of the atmosphere are constrained by the available energy (from the sun)
• The possibility of vapour intake is provided by the plants cover (and the soil if uncovered)
• The rate of the process are defined by the type of plant cover – both the transpiration
efficiency of the plants and the water retention capacity of the habitat – That gives the
superior performance of forests
Thornthwaite, Hare (Unasylva, 1955, 9. Évf./ 2) http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Study/AmazonEVI/
The effect of non-considering water retention – the example
of the Amazon basin
Daily run-off of two streams at summer period (by two hours periods)
The connection of transpiration and runoff in the Hidegvíz valley experiment site (Soproni hegység).
Summer run-off time series 12 days with the trend-line of water depletion
Gribovski Zoltán: Evapotranspiráció hatása a lefolyás napi ritmusára erdősült kisvízgyűjtőkön. In: Erdő és Klíma füzetek IV. Sopron 2004
Mitigating climate interferes with the nature’s ability to transpirate The leveled runoff are provided by the soils ability to store water
Soil humidity is the result of water retention that requires continuous land cover with deep soil – that’s what forests provides
www.maweb.org Consequences of Ecosystem Change for Human Well-being
The impact of ecosystem services on human well-being by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment research program
The 3 basic supporting service Nutrient circulation Primary production
Soil formation The possibility to draw of usufructs, a
capital embodied in the supporting
processes The rate of water
retention is the indicator of the
capital www.maweb.org Consequences of Ecosystem
Change for Human Well-being
Temperate Grasslands &
Woodlands Temperate Broadleaf Forest Tropical Dry Forest Tropical Grasslands Tropical Coniferous Forest Mediterranean Forests
Tropical Moist Forest
0 50 100 Percent of habitat (biome) remaining
Habitat Loss to 1990
Source: Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
Source: Heinz Ellenberg: Vegetation ecology of Central Europe (Vegetation Mitteleuropas mit den Alpen (1963)
The historical trend of river valley changes in CE
Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Conceptual Framework
Direct Drivers Indirect
Drivers
Ecosystem Services
Human Well-being
Direct Drivers of Change
Changes in land use
Species introduction or removal
Technology adaptation and use
External inputs (e.g., irrigation)
Resource consumption
Climate change
Natural physical and biological drivers (e.g., volcanoes)
Indirect Drivers of Change
Demographic
Economic (globalization, trade, market and policy framework)
Sociopolitical (governance and institutional framework)
Science and Technology
Cultural and Religious
Human Well-being and Poverty Reduction
Basic material for a good life
Health
Good Social Relations
Security
Freedom of choice and action
Life on Earth:
Biodiversity
Millennium Ecosystem Assessment www.maweb.org
The results of diminishing water circulation in the ecosystem services
www.maweb.org Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Consequences of Ecosystem Change for Human Well-being
Floods – Inland excess water – Growing irrigation needs
Soil – decay of productivity – Erosion Sink of subsoil water tables – droughts
Atmospheric extremities – Warming
• The increasing lack of services results in loss of well-being, so reducing natural capital a well-being deficit is emerging
• Increasing pressure on public sources to compensate the individual and public damages of the impacts generated by the ecological deficit
Air quality
Climate mitigation (cooling) CO2 sink
Erosion mitigation Water purification Disease control Pariasite control
Mitigation of natural disasters Regulating functions
The aggregation of the small but subsequent steps
• The forests consumed, the waters gone – the landscape impoverished and so the communities co-existed in it
• The living force of the landscape seeps with the water
• The step-by step deforestation decreased the ecological productivity.
• The drainage of the floodplains cut the supporting ecosystem service production.
The accumulation of natural capital stopped
• The exploitation of the ecosystem services based on the yields of natural capital changed to the eat up of the natural capital itself.
• The portfolio of the used usufructs shrinked and its application homogenized
• The human well-being degraded with nature – the group of beneficiaries concentrated, the ones crowded out increased. Common usufructs fall in expense of the private ones.
• Recent land use patterns are irrational, there is no place for water and forests. It results in a critically low productivity level of ecosystem processes – compared to its possible level
• As the missing amount of water grows as do the deficit of the ecosystem services
• The diminishing mitigation services of the ecosystem results in the growing frequency of climate extremities – rising negative impacts and rising costs to compensate them.
